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International Journal of Communication Call for Papers Special Section on Net Neutrality The Work for Internet Freedoms: Network Neutrality in the U.S. and the Labors of Policy Advocacy

Special Section Editors

Becky Lentz, McGill University Allison Perlman, University of California, Irvine

Deadline for submissions: August 31, 2015

When the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted in February 2015 to reclassify broadband under Title II of the Telecommunications Act, and thus to secure Network Neutrality and the principle of nondiscrimination at its center, it delivered an important victory to the millions of people who had insisted that strong Network Neutrality protections were crucial for an open, democratic Internet. This victory owed in large part to the tremendous outpouring of public support for Network Neutrality, which itself owed to the ongoing labors of community organizers, issue campaigners, funders, scholar activists, public interest lawyers and many others to make visible how issues of media policy fundamentally affect issues of social justice and political change.

For this special section, we seek articles that foreground these and other multiple labors involved in achieving policy victories like the Network Neutrality Order. We aim to make visible the often invisible work required to effect lawmaking, judicial rulings, and regulations in the public interest.

In this issue of the International Journal of Communication we take a capacious approach to the study of media advocacy labor. We encourage submissions that address this topic from a range of perspectives and seek diverse methodological approaches to the study of media advocacy. Submissions could address topics ranging from the role of philanthropic foundations in supporting advocacy labor to John Oliver¹s segment on Network Neutrality, Code Pink¹s public protests, or Free Press¹ National Conferences on Media Reform. Our goal is to provide an interdisciplinary look at the many labors of media advocacy and to foreground the ³how² and the ³why² of how media advocacy operates.

We specifically wish to publish historically and theoretically informed articles that are attentive to examples of multiple forms of advocacy labor. Topics could include (but are not limited to): · Investigations into the political economy of advocacy and to the many forms of capital (financial, informational, reputational, and/or cultural) that it requires

· Analyses of the cultural artifacts and performances that constitute advocacy work, such as educational videos, street theater/public demonstrations, political satire, op-ed columns,

· Examinations of the various strategies deployed by media advocacy groups, collectives, and networks, such as community organizing, popular education campaigns, lobbying, regulatory filings, strategic research, and policy advocacy pedagogy

· Examinations of the intersections between media policy advocacy and social justice activism

· Studies of how various news sources, including non-corporate and civil society outlets, reported on and framed advocacy work

Finally, we seek ideas for book reviews relevant to the topic of the special section (maximum 1,500 words including references; guidelines available).

Note: For this special section, we will not be seeking legal interpretations and policy analyses of the Network Neutrality issue itself; sufficient work already exists in this area in media, technology, and communication studies journals as well as law journals. Nor are we seeking normative papers advancing solutions to achieve Network Neutrality. Instead, our focus is on scholarship that foregrounds the processes and varieties of work required to intervene on behalf of the public interest in the Network Neutrality debate.

If interested, please submit full articles by August 31, 2015. Articles should be no more than 8,000 words (all-inclusive) and should follow the APA-6th Edition style guide. Articles should be submitted to http://ijoc.org <http://ijoc.org> and specify ³Net Neutrality Special Section² in your entry. For author guidelines, see http://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/about/submissions#authorGuidelines <http://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/about/submissions#authorGuidelines> .

Please direct any questions about topics, formats, article length and expected submission standards to the special section editors Becky Lentz (becky.lentz@mcgill.ca <mailto:becky.lentz@mcgill.ca> ) and Allison Perlman (aperlman@uci.edu <mailto:aperlman@uci.edu> ). Be sure to specify ³Net Neutrality Special Section² in your email subject line.